ELUARD, Paul. Une leçon de morale: poémes.

Paris: Gallimard, 1949.

8vo. (188 x 113mm.). Unopened, inscribed by Eluard in purple ink on half title, publisher’s original advert printed on yellow paper loosely inserted (small shallow crease). Publisher’s paper wrappers printed in red and black, glassine wrappers. One very short crack to spine, head and foot very lightly bumped, upper joint with very short chip at foot, one or two tiny creases. A fine association copy.

First edition, an unopened service de presse copy INSCRIBED by Eluard to the publisher Albert Skira. ‘Une leçon de morale’ is a collection still very much anchored in Eluard’s feelings of loss and despair after the death of his wife Nusch in 1947. Most of the poems juxtapose a section of ‘wrong’ with ‘right’, a divide mirrored in Eluard’s own postwar moral situation. Having become active in the PCF (Partie Communiste Française) during his resistance activity in the War, he was now confronted with a post-war climate suspicious of Communism, and in a way this collection mourns the loss of the easier moral certainties of the pre-war era. Eluard’s sense of loss both for Nusch and for the hope of the pre-war world are here poignantly present.

Trés bel exemplaire de l’édition originale (service de presse), pas coupé, enrichi d’un envoi autographe d’Eluard á Albert Skira.